NBA Trade Rumors: Where Gortat ranks among possible deals

Posted on Feb 14, 2013

The Phoenix SunsMarcin Gortat, with a side of Jared Dudley came in 11th in the rankings. Seems fair. Remember, with ALL the "NBA sources" and ALL the "NBA insiders" together in Houston over the next few days we are almost assured to see an uptick in NBA Trade Rumors. Hang on to your socks!

11. MARCIN GORTAT, Phoenix Why isn't Gortat getting more attention? He seems like the classic example of a player who is in desperate need of a change of scenery. His numbers have suffered a bit without Steve Nash, but wouldn't anybody's? While we're on the Suns, Jared Dudley would also make a hell of a nice piece.

My only beef here is the exclusion of Sebastian Telfair and Jermaine O`Neal. As we have discussed many times on this great site, those guys are kind of obvious trade deadline deals. But, of course, from a national perspective they aren't exactly big ticket items.

Even more than Bassy to the Celtics, I think that J.O. to the Heat makes a ton of sense. The Heat certainly could use O'Neal's size and performance off their bench in certain playoff match-ups (Indy!) but they don't exactly have a lot to offer.

Young center Dexter Pitman's contract matches J.O. so that's easy and the Suns would get a young prospect to try out for the rest of the year. Pitman is putting up good D-league numbers (12 ppg, 9 rpg in only 25 mpg) and has been called up to the Heat a ton of times but has barely played (and done nothing worth noting).

I have a hard time seeing the Heat giving up a first round pick for J.O. and it probably doesn't matter since they've already traded away their 2013 and 2015 first rounders which means they can't legally trade their 2014. They do have a protected 2013 pick from Philly. I don't know if they are legally allowed to move that but it's likely moot since that price is too high for J.O....probably.

So, maybe Pitman and a 2nd rounder (which would likely have very little value to the Suns)? Is that enough for J.O.? I think so given where the Suns are. He's on an expiring contract anyway so even if the Suns like having him around for rebuilding vet leadership, they'd still have to convince him to stay which they could try and do anyway if they trade him.

Additional thought: Maybe there's a way to conditionally swap picks with Miami for that Philly pick if it turns out to be better than one of the other Suns picks? Clever, huh!